President Joe Biden steps off Marine One upon arrival at the Soldier Field landing zone on Wednesday. Biden is in Chicago for a campaign fundraiser.
Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
President Joe Biden returned to Chicago on Wednesday to scoop up more than $2 million for his re-election bid, sources told the Sun-Times, tapping into the deep pockets of Democratic megadonors a month after collecting some $2.5 million at another fundraiser in the city.
“People here know that the President has to be successful in the Midwest to win the election and are all-in on making that W happen,” Tamar Newberger, the Illinois chair of the Biden campaign Midwest Finance Council, told the Sun-Times in an email.
While there are lower-dollar events in the pipeline, the Wednesday fundraiser at the Palmer House Hilton for the Biden Victory Fund was aimed at megadonors: a $100,000 contribution was needed to be a “host”; $50,000 to be a “champion”; and $25,000 to be listed as an “advocate.” As in most big-dollar fundraisers, major contributors also get a photo with Biden.
Biden was last in Chicago on April 8, following a visit to the must-win Wisconsin.
Biden came to Chicago on Wednesday after official and political events in the battleground state of Wisconsin. The flight on Air Force One from the Mitchell Field airport in Milwaukee — the city hosting the Republican convention in July — to O’Hare took only 16 minutes, with the distance light years in politics, with Illinois a solid blue presidential state since 1992 and Wisconsin a White House battleground, seesawing between Democratic and GOP contenders. Biden helicoptered to the Soldier Field landing zone on Marine One. Chicago hosts the Democratic Convention in August.
As the fundraiser continued inside the Loop hotel, pro-Palestinian protesters demonstrated outside.
The co-hosts of the Wednesday reception are Jane and Bob Clark; Tom Carnahan; and Susan and Bob Wislow, according to an invitation obtained by the Sun-Times. Clark, a major backer of Biden and former President Barack Obama, is the founder of Clayco, the construction firm.
Carnahan, a leader in the wind farm power industry, comes from a famous Missouri political family. Wislow, chief of Parkside Reality and a civic activist in Chicago, is a longtime Biden backer.
The Palmer House Hilton in the Loop is a hotel with a storied political history. The hotel served as Bill Clinton’s temporary headquarters during the 1992 primary when he won the Super Tuesday primaries and clinched the Democratic presidential nomination by winning the St. Patrick’s Day primary in Illinois.
In 2013, Hillary Rodham Clinton, a Chicago native, held her first presidential fundraiser in her hometown in the same hotel.
Duckworth, Krishnamoorthi co-host DC fundrasier for Biden
On May 1, Illinois Democrats Sen. Tammy Duckworth and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi co-hosted a fundraiser Biden headlined at a hotel in Washington targeting Asian American voters. The event was held on the first day of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and a source told the Sun-Times the haul was $1.1 million.
Duckworth introduced Biden. When the president came to the podium, he said, jokingly: “My name is Joe Biden. I work for Tammy Duckworth. Folks, I want to thank Tammy for that introduction — most of all, for her friendship and her partnership. And, Raja, your partnership and leadership in the House has been invaluable.”